Where Do Domestic Cats Come From?

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Cats.

We know that they like to chase lasers and lick their own butts.

But there is a lot we don't know about cute little Whiskers, like where her cuddly, domestic ancestors came from, and when she evolved from wild animals.

We used to think that the earliest historical evidence for domestic cats was from ancient Egypt, like art and mummified remains from around 4000 years ago.

But now some clues are pointing to domestic kitties older than that, from separate places across the globe.

The oldest probably-domestic cat skeleton we've found was in 2001, on the island of Cyprus in the Mediterranean sea.

Scientists guessed that this cat lived around 9500 years ago, which makes sense historically.

That's after people had started farming in the Fertile Crescent, that not-totally-desert region in parts of western Asia and northern Africa.

Farming means you have to store extra crops somewhere, and piles of tasty grain attract rodents.

And for hungry cats, that's an all-you-can-eat buffet.

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